Harness racing can be cruel at times with injury stopping a lot of horses fulfilling their potential.
One horse that would fit that description to a tee is Boom Gate.
The five year old son of Courage Under Fire was a super impressive winner on debut when he took out the Sapling Stakes as a two year old but it has been far from plain sailing ever since.
Soundness issues have restricted his appearances to the point that tonight he was just having start number seventeen.
Now with Robert Dunn on the beach, Boom Gate has impressed his new trainers and they were confident of a forward showing tonight at Addington.
Away well from barrier nine for driver John Dunn, Boom Gate worked to the front after 400 metres and kept up a solid tempo in front.
John Dunn let him run from the 800 metres and as they turned for home the only challenger was Nevertheless who had had the trail the whole way.
Boom Gate sprinted away at the 200 metres mark and went to the line an easy winner by 1 3/4 lengths over Nevertheless with Livura running into third.
Boom Gate cut out the 2600 metres in 3:14.2, a mile rate of 2:00.1 with closing sectionals of 57.7 and 28.4.
Driver John Dunn was full of praise for Boom Gate post race.
" He did that fairly easily to be honest."
"He has always been a smart horse but injury has blighted his career," John said.
It hasn't all been plain sailing since he joined the Dunn camp either.
" The first time we worked him up he went sore on us so we had to stop.
" We gave him a couple of months out and started again and it has all gone smoothly this time."
" We will just take him day by day at the moment but that won't be his last win if he stays sound," John said.
The Dunn barn deserves all the kudos they get for getting Boom Gate back to the track and hopefully he can fulfill his early promise.
Harnesslink Media